When the banner went up on the British Airways Executive Club website last night, I brought you the news of the return of the 100,000 mile signup bonus for a British Airways Visa from Chase.
Now the offer is up on the British Airways Executive Club website with full details.
Apply by May 6, 2011 and you’ll also receive our most generous enrollment offer of the year—up to 100,000 bonus BA Miles. You’ll earn 50,000 bonus BA Miles after your first purchase2 on the card and an additional 50,000 bonus BA Miles after spending $2,500 on your card within the first three months of activation.
Since the offer is supposed to run through May 6, there’s not a hurry (though it could always be pulled early).
Great deal, definitely look seriously at it and consider applying for this bonus.
Thanks for the early notification. Couple of questions:
Does this offer include the free companion certificate for spending $30K within 1 year (meaning till April of 2012)?
On a related question, do know any good way to use the BA certificate w/o going through London from US?
Cardmember will receive the voucher 4-6 weeks after the billing cycle when the Cardmember reaches $30,000 in purchases, and will not be eligible for another voucher until the next calendar year.
From T&C on BA
And just so you know, the voucher for me was posted online on my BA account which I didn’t realize until several weeks later as I was anticipating a paper version.
“This one-time bonus offer is valid only for first-time cardmembers with new accounts. Previous and existing cardmembers/accounts are not eligible for this bonus offer.”
“This one-time bonus offer is valid only for first-time cardmembers with new accounts. Previous and existing cardmembers/accounts are not eligible for this bonus offer.”
First time BA Visa card members right? My application on the Continental MasterCard was rejected recently, so I’m thinking I should hold off until early May to apply.
How often can you apply for a chase-issued cards? I remember vaguely something like a “one-card-in-6-months” rule or something, so does it mean those who have recently applied for CO card can not apply now? If that rule is not true, can one apply for CO an BA cards in one day, like the case with AA cards where you could apply for two personal cards in one day?
I don’t quite understand how the companion ticket voucher is earned. Is it for spending per calendar year (such as 2011) ot for any 12 month period (say April 2011-April 2012)?
Thank you.
@ Lantean and luvflying11: The spending period for the 2-4-1 voucher is the calendar year, Jan 1 to Dec 31.
Gary,
Maybe I’m missing something, but I’m just not as excited about this offer as you are.
I get most excited about premium cabin travel for torturous flights. If I was a west coastie, it would be one thing but as an IAD’er, DC-LHR just doesn’t qualify. I do get excited about free coach travel to Europe. (After all, a free trip to Europe is a free trip to Europe.)
I am aware of the companion cert (and I need it for my wife, she won’t qualify for this card), and that it can be valuable. But, I also have spend requirements on two C1 cards and the AA visa to meet. Hitting $30k is going to be an effort, which I might possibly do for the right deal, but it might be unlikely. Even $2500 in three months will require some planning, given the other spend I have to do.
But when I look at what 100,000 BA miles can do for me, I see:
1. One NA-Europe Zone 1 ticket in J + taxes, fees, and surcharges. I’m fine with the later, but I’ll need to jump through hoops for the companion certificate, and this trip just isn’t worth it. J isn’t *that* important on an 8 hour flight.
2. Two NA-Europe Zone 1 tickets in Y + taxes, fees, and surcharges. This in and of itself is reasonable, but a $1k copay for two tickets just kills a lot of the excitement.
The best awards for me are beyond Europe. At 180,000 PER TICKET, J to Asia is out. I don’t have enough miles, can’t buy enough, and then would have to jump to get the companion cert on top of all of that.
So let’s look at Premium Economy.
I priced and IAD-DXB trip in mid November. WT+ costs $2400/pp. BA wants $800/pp for taxes, fees, charges, and surcharges. (This is a revenue ticket. I assume this is what I pay for the award surcharges.) A WT+ award costs 120,000 miles. I’ll have to buy 20k miles (presumably $400 worth at $.02/mile) and pay $800/pp per ticket, AND bend over backwards to reach 30k in spend for the companion cc. I’ll have to cough up $2,000 for this “free” trip and bend over backwards at the expense of other loyalty earnings. All I got out of this was a little more than the equivalent of one free WT+ ticket.
If I went the cash+miles option, I’d still have to pony up for an extra 20,000 miles, but I wouldn’t have to jump through the hoops to get the companion cert. But, I’d have to add a copay of $705/pp. So, adding the taxes/charges, copay, and miles costs together, each ticket still costs me $1700. I can buy it for $2400 and not worry about award seats!
So… 100k BA miles in and of themselves don’t excite me. Even if my wife could qualify for the card, the best we could do is two J seats from IAD-LHR.
@Dan
A lot of people are excited to have 100,000 miles as you can use them on AA flights and LAN flights and you can have a stop over using BA miles… no fuel surgarges in those cases, no need to use these miles on actualy BA flights.
Best,
PedroNY
@Dan don’t forget that Membership Rewards is partners with BA and from time to time they do a bonus when transferring miles to the BA account. Also the no foreign transaction fee alone make this card great. Also in the year I have had it I have earned bonus 15k miles from various other Chases promotions, the mile can add up quickly.
@Dan
The best value out of this is the single partner award redemptions. See this URL: http://www.britishairways.com/travel/partnertable/public/en_us#northamerica
From NA to Far East in business class, it only requires 50,000 miles one way, or 100,000 miles round trip + CX fees. Far East are : Burma, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, Vietnam
@Dan US to South America is 80k in business roundtrip, 120k in first, as long as you stay on a single airline in each direction (eg American, LAN). Think Easter Island with unlimited stopovers as long as you follow a logical routing along the way.
US to much of Asia is 100k in business roundtrip on either Japan Airlines or Cathay Pacific.
And the taxes/fees on partners, while not non-existent, are lower. E.g. ~ $250 for a Cathay Pacific roundtrip business award all-in.
Gary, I already have 3 Chase cards, one for United which I use and pay in full every month, one for Hyatt that I got in October 2010 for the promotion for 2 free nights, and one I haven’t even received in the mail for Priority Points. Need I not even bother applying for a 4th one? Your suggestions, please!
Has anyone had a problem reaching the actual application for this card? I have clicked on “apply” from different computers over the past 3 days and the link is dead. Any suggestions? Starting from here: http://www.britishairways.com/travel/creditcards/public/en_us clicking on the “apply” button just brings up an error. It’s been that way for 3 days now.
As per Bill’s comment I also can not actually get to the application. Tried in different browsers. Firefox resolves that I am being redirected in a way that will never resolve and explorer just will never load it. Tried it on the first day, and just again right now 4/11/11
I applied last Wednesday and have yet to receive confirmation. Any additional steps that I can take?
Works fine for me. You have to allow pop up windows in order to see the application.
(Using Firefox 3.6.13)
I applied like Falcor last week and didn’t get any confirmation other than they are reviewing my application, although I did strangely get an email enrolling me into BA EC…does that mean anything?
I have a question…I got the card, paid the annual fee, did the 30K spend and received an electronic companion certificate good for 2 years. It has been a year now and they have billed me for the annual fee again. I don’t want to pay it and am thinking of cancelling the card. Do I have to be holding the card to use the companion certificate when booking award travel? Will likely be going to Asia (eventually) with some stopovers, but already have some trips booked this year and it will likely be 2012 before I use these miles. I don’t want to cancel the card if I lose the companion certificate. Anyone know the answer to this?
Anybody got this card? i applies a few weeks ago when it started and it said “the applic was being reviewed” but haven’t heard anything sice? thx!
I just applied and it told me the application was approved and I should get my card and info within 2 weeks.
How do you book the one partner airline tickets? I’m looking at the BA website, but I don’t see the option of using miles for flights… What am I missing? Thank you!
Re: “being reviewed.” I applied for the card online for myself and separately for my wife. I got instant approval. For my wife the website said “application being reviewed.” Both our cards arrived on the same day, about 10 days later.
The terms say that to earn the 2nd set of 50,000 miles I have to spend $2500 within the first 90 days of account opening. I’m trying to determine what the date of my deadline is for this. Is day one the day they charged the annual fee to my account? Or is it the day I was approved for the card?
I applied in April 2011 to take advantage of their 100k mileage offer. The next day Chase checked my credit history. (I know that because I’m a subscriber of a credit monitoring service).
After 4 weeks I called, and there was no trace of my application. But I know they received it because CHASE immediately checked my credit score. I reapplied in June, got the card but by then I lost the opportunity to get the 100k miles.
I suspect they tossed a lot of applications for April’s offer after they reached their quorum.
I’m pissed.